Gregory LaCava Day - March 10th, 2011

[moira finnie]

You might want to wait to read this until after you've had a chance to see Living in a Big Way (1947) yourself.

It's just my opinion, but I think that there are some wonderful parts of Living in a Big Way that are better than the whole. Living in a Big Way (1947) was the first movie that Kelly made after returning from a stint in the Navy. It has an exuberant routine with Gene Kelly dancing with kids, dogs and using a construction site as his playground that is still exhilarating, no matter how many times I've seen it. An inventive dance set in a backyard with Kelly and a statue is mildly amusing fun too. MGM was still unsure of what to do with the talent of Kelly and his fellow choreographer, Stanley Donen, and the script doesn't help a bit. Gene and Marie "The Body" McDonald had zilch chemistry. Kelly reportedly called her a "triple threat: she can't act, she can't sing and she can't dance". Gene Kelly was compelled by MGM (and Marie McDonald's personal producer Hunt Stromberg, who was involved with the actress) to prepare a relatively simple duet for the pair to do to the tune "It Had To Be You" on screen after the film's first disastrous preview. It is okay, though I think Gene had more rapport with a piece of newspaper and a mop as his dance partners.

There are other elements at work in the movie that might have saved the story: Phyllis Thaxter as an appealing war widow is tossed in to the mix to provoke jealousy, though she and Kelly seem to have had more of an affinity than McDonald. Gregory La Cava sneaks some mildly naughty elements into the script, including some nice dialogue, such as a doctor's comment when someone tells him that the McDonald character is brooding about something, he replies "If she has anything on her mind it's a step in the right direction." At another point one character also comments that "If a lady asks you to jump on her bed, you'd better do it - she may not repeat the invitation!" These and some other innuendos in the storyline about quickie marriages aren't able to overcome the B movie aspects of the script and production. La Cava, whose alcoholism had strained his reputation for years in Hollywood despite his gifts, received his last official feature film credit for this movie. (He supposedly did some work on One Touch of Venus too).